U.S. Victory Drought Is Expected to Continue : Strange Given the Best Chance in British Open at Royal Lytham & St. Annes

Here at Royal Lytham & St. Annes Golf Club, where the only thing longer than its name is the railroad track that stretches along the right side of the course, a magnum of champagne at a concession tent runs 52 pounds, or about $90.

This means that the dollar doesn’t last any longer here than the U.S. golfers do in the British Open.

Since 1983, Americans have put their names on the entry list as if they were filing missing persons reports.

How many Americans have won the Open since Tom Watson did it five years ago at Royal Birkdale?

Not a one. Yes, it’s surely been a long dry spell, the only thing that remained dry after the wind came up and blew cold showers on the course Tuesday afternoon.

Steve Pate was caught by the driving rain on the driving range, which seemed appropriate.

“Why don’t they play this thing in the summer?” Pate joked.

But when the 117th Open begins Thursday, European Ryder Cup captain Tony Jacklin says it will be the resumption of a parched four-day spell for the Americans. And he wasn’t talking about the weather, either.

Jacklin, who won the 1969 British Open at Royal Lytham, needed just one look at the field to come to a conclusion about American chances.

“I can’t see beyond a European win,” Jacklin said. “I can’t see an American winning.”

And why is that?

“I don’t think they’re as good as we are,” he said.

Jacklin admitted his bias, but he has reason to believe a European will win. His Ryder Cup teams have beaten the United States the last two times. Also, no American pro has won on the Royal Lytham course in the seven times the British Open has been played here, although Bobby Jones won in 1926 as an amateur.

History may be on Jacklin’s side, but Curtis Strange, last year’s PGA player on the year, and Paul Azinger, the U.S. tour’s leading money winner, are not. Strange, who won $925,941 last year, disagreed with Jacklin, but said he would not debate with him.

“I want to go out and play and let my golf clubs do the talking,” Strange said.

If his clubs could say anything, it would be probably be a plea to hit the ball straight. Accuracy off the tee is at a premium on this relatively short, 6,857-yard course with narrow fairways. There is no water but plenty of bunkers and enough rough to feed a hungry flock of sheep for light years.

Links courses are assumed to favor Europeans who play more of them, but Azinger thought more of the Americans’ chances than Jacklin did.

“How can he say that Americans have no chance here?” Azinger said. “That’s not too smart. He’s older than me and he probably knows better, but how can you say that Tom Kite, Fred Couples, Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Raymond Floyd, Mark Calcavecchia, Payne Stewart, Chip Beck or Lanny Wadkins have no chance?

“How can you say Lanny Wadkins can’t win here? There are a lot of Americans who can.”

So why hasn’t anyone?

“It may be just coincidence more than anything else,” said Azinger, who coincidentally could have won in Scotland last year when he had a one-shot lead with two holes to go at Muirfield, but bogeyed them both and lost to Nick Faldo.

In fact, Americans have won on this course. In 1961 and 1977, the U.S. Ryder Cup team won at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. It could happen again, but the oddsmakers don’t think so.

The bookmakers here have made Sandy Lyle and Seve Ballesteros the co-favorites at 8-1.

Strange is the highest American at 14-1. Only two others, Azinger and Ben Crenshaw, rate better than 25-1.

While the best U.S. golfers seemed preoccupied with their odds, tournament co-favorite Lyle seemed unconcerned.

He scheduled himself a day off today, so he could spend it at the beach at nearby Blackpool.

That’s the way it has been going at the British Open lately. The European golfers are playing in the sand and the Americans are driving into it.